The career ambition of every law professor is to advance the understanding of the law. Robert Palmer has achieved that and more in launching the first phase of The Anglo-American Legal Tradition – a remarkable project documenting English common law and equity materials from the 13th through 17th centuries.

For the past several years, Robert has invested countless hours capturing digital images of legal records stored at the National Archives in London, England. The leather-bound pages of sheepskin and parchment may represent the world’s largest collection of medieval texts, and Robert’s work ensures that these priceless records will be preserved in digital form for generations to come.

More than three million images will ultimately be acquired and stored on computer servers maintained at our O’Quinn Law Library. Rather than traveling to the National Archives, legal scholars and historians throughout the world will be able to complete their important research via the internet.

This is an extraordinary body of work, and it reinforces the caliber of our faculty and the excellence of our school. I would recommend Robert for academic knighthood, but I suspect that he would politely decline any public recognition in favor of more time with his precious pages of history.

For a quick look at his project – and a glimpse of how law was practiced when broadswords outnumbered briefcases – click to this link: http://aalt.law.uh.edu.